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Getting a little tired of carrying that pesky cash around in your pockets?
Don't worry, soon, you won't even be able to use it, even if you wanted to!
The Beast's plan to mark us all is clearly underway, and it looks like it's
just a matter of time before we're all using the mark of The Beast to buy
and sell.
Now, it's easy to get lost in some wacko religious tirade on all this stuff.
After all, in the Bible (Revelation 13, verses 16 & 17) it does mention that we
will all be commanded to receive the mark of The Beast:
"And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to
receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:
"And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of
the beast, or the number of his name."
But this isn't about religion or prophecy or anything like that. It's about
CONTROL. By moving us to a cashless society, The Beast can keep nearly
flawless track of how much money we have, how much we make, how much we spend
and even what we spend it on. And each purchase you make will also carry tons
of personal information to be crunched, evaluated and used by The Beast's
servants on Madison Avenue and inside the Beltway.
Imagine a day (soon) when you need a "national ID card" for any and all
interactions with government agencies, from filing your taxes to buying stamps.
No card? Better get one. Can't file your taxes without the card, and everyone
has got to file taxes.
Now, imagine a day (soon) when the vast majority of purchases are made with a
simple debit card (much like your ATM card) that transfers money from your
bank account to the merchant's account. But it also tells the merchant how old
you are, where you bank, what your favorite color is, where you live and so on.
Starting to get a little worried? You should be. The government is already planning
a system whereby, instead of filing your taxes, you'll simply get a tax "bill" in
the mail. Pay it. Or else. If you doubt this, read the articles below (reprinted
without permission from PC Week and Time magazine) for verification.
How can you fight back? Pay cash. Resist being "marked by The Beast." Keep the
information that you want private from being used to sell you stuff or identify
you as an "undesirable" by refusing to give your social security number out to
anyone who asks for it. Does Blockbuster Video really need to know your social
security number when they've already got your credit card number? Protect your
private and sensitive personal information--you have every right to keep it private.
Some aspects of a cashless society may seem more convenient at first glance,
and there's no arguing that if there were no potential for government or big
business abuse, cashless debit transactions would be best for everyone, but
government and big business have always abused their powers. And "the mark of
The Beast" will only create a society where the disenfranchised will become
moreso and the rich and powerful will exploit every advantage (legal and illegal)
to become moreso. Don't accept the "mark of The Beast."
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Postal Service, IRS developing national identity cards; Clinton may
give OK by Mitch Ratcliffe PC Week 9 May 1994
The Clinton administration is working on creating an identification card that
every American will need to interact with any federal government agency.
The card initiative came into the forefront at last months CardTech/SecureTech
Conference in Crystal City, Va., as federal agencies, including the US Postal
Service and the Internal Revenue Service, began detailing their various
proposals.
At the gathering--where security experts convened to discuss business and
government applications for "smart card" and PCMCIA memory-card
technologies--the Postal service presented a proposal tor a ''general-purpose
U.S. services smart card," which individuals and companies would use to
authenticate their identities when sending and receiving e-mail, transferring
funds, and interacting with various government agencies.
Sources close to the administraiton said President Clillton is also considering
signing a pair of executive orders that would facilitate the connection of indi-
viduals' bank accounts and federal records to a government identification card.
White House officials declined to comment.
The Postal Service's U.S. Card would use either smart cardsĄ plastic cards that
carly a unique number that can be read by a scanner linked to computerized
records stored on a network-- or PCMCIS cards, which can contain megabytes of
personal identification.
At the conference, postal rep- r es( ntative Chuck Chamberlain outlilled how an
individual's U.S. Card would be automatical- ly connected wih the Depart- ment
ot'Healtll and Human Ser- vices, the U.S. Treasury, the IRS, the banking system,
and a cen- tral database of digital signa- tures f'or use in authenticating
E-mail and other transactions.
While the U.S. Card is only a proposal, the Postal Service is prepared to put
more than 100 million of the cards in citizens' pocket.s within months of admin-
istration approval, which could come at any time, said Chamber- lain, who is
based in Washington.
"We've been trying to Coll- vince people [in the dit'terent agencies] to do just
one card; otherwise we're going to end up with two or three cards," he said.
The Postal Senice's U.S. Card would serve a n ber of t'unc- tions: checking the
authenticity of a digital signature to screen out impostors when sending or
receiving E-mail; registering banking transactions (notably credit-card
purchases) that de- pend on authentication; and helping veterans, college stu-
dents, and welfare recipients check their federal benefits. In addition, the
card could give emergency-room visitors instant access to medical records or
health-insurance information.
While these examples may seem benigll separately, col e - tively they paint a
picture of a cit- izen's or business' existenc( that could be meddlesome at best
and downright totalital ian at worst, industr observers said.
For example, buying a book at a gay bookstore with a cre(lit card that
authenticates the tralls- action througll the Postal Sel-- vice migllt opell a
naval officel up to court martial. Similallv, lunching with a business associ-
ate on a Saturday at a fdlllily res- taulant could lead the IRS to rule the
expense non dedllctihle before a person even claimed it.
"There won't be anything you do in business that won't be col- lected and
analyzed by the govern- ment," said William Murray, an in- tormation system
security consult- ant to accounting film Deloitte & Touche in New Canaan, Conn.
who saw the presentation. "This is a better surveillance mechanism than Orwell
or the government could have imagined."
The full text of this story is available in the May 9 issue of Digital Media: A
Seybold Report (published by Ziff-Davis Publishing). Contact Digital Media on
the Internet at dmedia@netcom.com.
---------------------------------------------
FEEL LIKE YOU'RE BEING WATCHED? YOU WILL ... 'DIGITAL MEDIA' REPORTS ONNATIONAL
IDENTIFICATION CARD SAN FRANCISCO, May 9 /PRNewswire/ -- The May 9, 1994, issue
of "Digital Media" will report that the Clinton administration is debating not
if, but how, to create a card every American will need to interact with any
federal government agency. Combined with two potential executive orders and the
Postal Service's designs on putting its stamp on personal and business
electronic transactions, the card could open a window on every nuance of
American personal and business life, the newsletter said.
Individuals and companies will need the cards to interact with federal agencies,
including the Internal Revenue Service, the Veterans Administration and the
Department of Health and Human Services. Despite claims the use of the card
will be voluntary, researchers at the agencies developing a proposed federal
identification card, the United States Postal Service and NASA's Ames research
facility, said the so-called "U.S. Card" will be designed specifically to
deliver government services electronically. For instance, an individual's
income and spending could be tracked by the IRS through the National Information
Infrastructure, eliminating the need to file an income tax return at year end.
"It may be impossible to live in the United States without this card," said
Mitch Ratcliffe, Editor-in-Chief of "Digital Media." "The administration may
say it is voluntary, but it will be difficult at best to participate in our
economy without it."
Sources told "Digital Media" President Clinton is contemplating an executive
order which would automate tax collection by allowing the IRS to monitor
personal bank accounts. The White House did not respond to repeated calls for
comment on this matter.
The U.S. Postal Service confirmed the National Security Agency, which introduced
the controversial Clipper chip into the national cryptography debate last year,
participated in the design of the U.S. Card.
This national identity card would make the following scenarios a reality:
-- When sending or receiving electronic mail, U.S. Card users would be able to
check the authenticity of a digital signature to screen out impostors.
-- Banking transactions (notably credit card purchases) that require an audit
trail and verification of the purchaser's identities would be registered in
Postal Service systems.
-- Veterans, college students and welfare recipients, among others, could check
their federal benefits using the identification data on their U.S. Cards.
-- Visitors to an emergency room would have instant access to medical records at
other hospitals, as well as to their health insurance information.
These examples may seem benign separately, but collectively they could be used
to paint a picture of a citizen's or business's activities that could be
meddlesome at best and downright totalitarian at worst, the newsletter said.
Could buying a book at a gay bookstore with a credit card that authenticates the
transaction through the Postal Service put a Navy officer at risk for a court
marshal? If you have lunch with a business associate on a Saturday, will the
IRS rule the expense non-deductible before you even claim it?
"Digital Media" is preparing a Freedom of Information Act request for documents
related to the creation of the U.S. Card proposal.
The full text of the "Digital Media" article detailing the government's plans
appears in the May issue, Volume 3.12. Single copies are available for $40 from
Seybold Publications. For more information or to order, call 800-325-3830, or
write Seybold Publications, 428 E. Baltimore Pike, PO Box 644, Media, PA
19063.
"Digital Media" is a pan-industry newsletter published by Seybold Publications.
The monthly newsletter tracks the technologies, products and players in the
digital world, while providing a strategic overview and examination of the
issues, realities and repercussions of these world-altering events.
Founded in 1971, Seybold Publications is a division of Ziff Communications' ZD
Expos organization. Seybold produces three industry newsletters: "Digital
Media: A Seybold Report," "The Seybold Report on Publishing Systems" and "The
Seybold Report on Desktop Publishing."
/delval/ -0- 5/6/94 /CONTACT: Mitch Ratcliffe,
415-575-3775, or 206-581-1892, or Molly Joss, 800-325-3830, both of Seybold
Publications/ CO: Seybold Publications ST: California; Pennsylvania IN: PUB
SU:
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THE ECONOMY
NO CHECKS. NO CASH. NO FUSS?
Despite glitches and issues of privacy, more Americans are turning to cards and
computers to pay their bills
BY THOMAS MCCARROLL
Leigh anderson is getting rid of her cash. She uses a bank-issued debit card to
buy everything from groceries and gasoline to stamps at the post office. ''I
used to keep spare change for coffee, but the 7-Eleven just started accepting
the card,'' says the 33-year-old education consultant. She shuns checks too,
having signed up for a new computer service called ScanFone that lets her pay
her credit-card, utility and 17 other bills in just 10 minutes by tapping a few
numbers on the keypad of a high-tech telephone that sends instructions to the
company's central computer. ''I guess you don't have to see your money to have
it or spend it,'' she says. ''It's a little weird, but dollars aren't clean
anyway.''
Ever since 1888, when philosopher Edward Bellamy foresaw a utopian world where
money would be replaced by a card based on the ''credit'' built up by workers
with their labor, financial prognosticators have hailed the coming of the
cashless society. Club Med founder Gilbert Trigano tried to create some cashless
utopias of his own by asking his guests to pay for things with beads as part of
their tropical vacations. But in everyday life, consumers until now have largely
chosen to hold on to their coin purses, dollar bills and checkbooks, reflecting
an atavistic, under-the-mattress reluctance to part with their purchasing
power.
These days it looks as though more Americans than ever are willing to let go.
They are traveling through coinless tollbooths, banking at branchless banks,
riding in tokenless subways and paying for everything from taxi rides to
mortgages with the swipe of a card or the blip of an electronic transfer. Such
transactions accounted for 18% of the $55 trillion total that consumers,
corporations and governments spent last year. But the number of electronic
transfers has increased nearly 200% since 1986, in contrast to a 17% rise in the
number of check and cash transactions. And the volume of household bills paid
through automated systems such as ScanFone and Checkfree Corp. has doubled since
1991, to 800 million last year; 20% of utility bills, 16% of auto loans and 17%
of mortgage installments are now paid electronically.
Retailers of all kinds are going the cashless way. Supermarkets such as Safeway
and Giant, fast-food restaurants such as Wendy's and Burger King, newspaper
stands in Philadelphia's CoreStates Bank Plaza and even some taxis in Manhattan
are now accepting credit cards. The New York City transit authority has joined
the Washington Metro and the Bay Area Rapid Transit line in installing a
fare-card system, which has contributed to a 40% drop in fare beating this year
and could soon be used to introduce different price levels that reward frequent
riders. Some states, among them Maryland, are replacing food stamps and welfare
checks with bank cards that give welfare recipients access to prearranged
monthly sums. At the New York City synagogue Ohab Zedek, members can have their
monthly donations electronically deducted directly from their bank accounts.
''This makes giving more painless,'' says Sol Zalcgendler, the congregation's
executive director.
Meanwhile, fewer checks are in the mail. More than a third of all U.S. workers
have their paychecks directly deposited into their bank accounts, compared with
8% in 1988. Almost half of the Federal Government's annual budget is transferred
electronically -- to pay the salaries of 1.9 million people (or 86% of its
civilian payroll) as well as benefits for war veterans and subsidies for
farmers. This year the Internal Revenue Service will send refunds to the bank
accounts of 10.5 million taxpayers, 7% more than last year. And in the private
sector, computers are now handling 10% of the $50 billion in money transfers
between corporations and their suppliers.
So has the cashless era of the philosophers finally arrived? So far, with every
advance made by encoded plastic cards and automated billing systems, there have
also been glitches or concerns about fraud and privacy. At Chemical Bank, for
example, automated teller machines mistakenly deducted a total of $16 million
from 100,000 customer accounts in February because of a typographical error in a
single line of computer code. The bank bounced 430 checks as a result of the
malfunction.
Or consider the problem of fraud, which high-speed computers can unwittingly
abet. According to the irs, the number of fraudulent electronic filings doubled
to 26,000 last year, at a cost to the government of nearly $54 million, as
computers spat out refunds before IRS examiners could go over the returns. Such
incidents have led critics to warn that the rush to automated payment systems is
proceeding too fast even for computer experts. ''The demands on software are far
outpacing the development of software,'' says Dain Gary, a manager at the
Software Engineering Institute at Carnegie-Mellon University.
Small wonder that the advance toward a cashless society has created a new
category of frustrated consumers. Hudson Hendren, an engineer in Herndon,
Virginia, was mortified last summer when the phone company shut off his service
after failing to receive a payment he had made through the ScanFone system. In
New York City, hundreds of subway passengers complained last month that the new
electronic fare cards were double-charging them for rides or failing to let them
through the automated turnstiles. A spokesman for the Metropolitan
Transportation Authority blamed the confusion on riders who had not yet learned
to use the cards properly and were running them twice through the bar-code
reader at the turnstile.
Above all, high-tech payment systems create new problems of privacy even as they
increase convenience and efficiency. Maryland became the first state to provide
debit cards for welfare clients last year when it issued its ''Independence
Card'' to 170,000 households that received public aid. The cards enable
recipients to shop at supermarkets such as Giant and Safeway as well as at 3,500
other stores around the state; families on welfare can also use the cards to
withdraw cash from ATM machines and to pay utility bills and rent for public
housing. Among other benefits, these cards have virtually eliminated the expense
of preparing and distributing welfare checks.
But privacy advocates fear that state bureaucrats could use the cards to pry
into the personal lives of welfare recipients by tracing their electronic
purchases. ''Poor people are an easy mark,'' says Robert Ellis Smith, who
publishes the Privacy Journal, a monthly periodical in Providence, Rhode Island.
''They're resented by the public, which thinks they should be monitored.''
The push for a cashless society is gaining momentum, however, if only because
making money disappear is also a way of saving money. There are about 12 billion
pieces of U.S. paper currency, worth $150 billion, circulating worldwide, which
works out to about $30 for every person on earth. Keeping all that paper in use
is a costly chore for the government. Most $1 bills wear out after about 18
months. To retire, destroy and replace all aging currency costs the government
an estimated $200 million a year. Currency is cumbersome for businesses as well.
People have to count it, armored cars have to carry it, bank vaults have to
store it and security guards have to protect it.
Checks too are expensive to handle. About 55 billion checks are written every
year (more than 37% of all consumer payments), and the processing costs the
nation's financial institutions about $1.30 each. Banks end up losing money on
about half of all checking accounts, since the handling costs often exceed the
interest earned on lending out the deposits. An electronic transfer, on the
other hand, costs only 15 cents per blip.
Some of the biggest users of electronic transfers have thus reaped substantial
benefits. The Federal Government saved $133 million last year by paying 47% of
its 815 million bills by computer rather than by mail. And General Electric,
which received 40% of its $60 billion in revenues electronically in 1993,
expects to spend $2.5 million less for stamps and envelopes this year because it
is using computers to pay 1,000 of its suppliers.
But savings are not the only reason Americans are warming to the idea of parting
with their cash. Electronic transfers are starting to become convenient. These
days 23% of homes have personal computers, in contrast to 11% five years ago. As
a result, some 900,000 subscribers are signed up with banking services via
online information systems like Prodigy. ''I don't know how I got along without
it all this time,'' says Floraine Alba, a grandmother in New Providence, New
Jersey. Alba used to write 50 checks a month. But she now uses ScanFone and
willingly pays $11.95 a month to cut three to four hours off her bill chores.
''Spending all day writing checks and stuffing envelopes was bad enough,'' adds
Alba. ''I then had to go stand in line at the post office.'' The main weapon
against cash and checks is plastic -- credit cards, bank debit cards and
so-called smart cards. Together they represent 9% of total consumer payment
transactions and are expected to reach 15% by 2001. Besides taxicabs and
newsstands, credit cards are employed in parking garages and movie theaters and
could soon be the way that Americans pay their taxes, if industry lobbyists
prevail. But since card issuers charge an average of 16.5% while the irs
extracts only 7% for late payments, consumer groups warn that taxpayers should
be wary. So far, stiff interest rates have done little to curb the use of
plastic. The number of Visa and MasterCards in use has climbed 3% in the past
year, to 225 million, while credit-card transactions have jumped 7.3%, to 1.7
billion.
But the fastest-growing charge cards are the ones that automatically deduct
money from checking accounts. The amounts riding on such debit-card use could
zoom nearly 600% over the next eight years, according to H. Spencer Nilson of
the Nilson Report, an Oxnard, California, newsletter that follows this
industry.While Visa's credit-card business grew 16% last year, the use of its
''CheckCard'' debit service jumped 47%, as consumers sought to avoid finance and
interest charges.
Both credit and debit cards could one day be eclipsed by smart cards, which look
like conventional bank plastic but store information on computer chips instead
of magnetic stripes. Such cards could hold, say, the profile of an airline
passenger, including his frequent-flyer points and seat preferences. With a
single swipe of a card through an airline's electronic reader, a traveler could
make a reservation and get a seat assignment.
The card can also carry specific dollar values. Newspapers like the Philadelphia
Inquirer are testing $10 cards that would deduct 50 cents each time they are
inserted in news racks. No more fumbling for loose change. Telephone companies
are issuing cards good for so many minutes of calling time. And a brand-new
electronic highway toll system developed by AT&T and Lockheed in Orange County,
California, lets drivers pay without stopping. Radio receivers pick up signals
from dashboard-mounted cards as vehicles zip through toll lanes. The fees are
deducted directly from the drivers' bank accounts. Says Bob Bess, a
customer-service representative who lives in Trabuco Canyon, California: ''It's
kind of fun to whiz by at 60 miles an hour while others are waiting in line.''
Not everyone striving to be cashless has achieved this sense of breezy
convenience. But the vision seems only a few mishaps and controversies away.
Copyright 1994 Time Inc. All rights reserved.
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